I have never been more proud today to see the news that Governor Sarah Palin is the Republican vice presidential nominee.

This is an inspired choice by John McCain. He doubled down on “maverick reformer” this morning by picking someone who has been standing up for — and delivering — change in her state. She has fought corruption, even in her own party, and delivered big reforms to Alaska.

And she’s a mom of five, with an inspiring family. The Palin’s son, Trig, was born just this past April, with Down’s Syndrome — and given that 90% of diagnosed Down’s Syndrome children are never born, this fact puts actions above words when it comes to believing that every human life has value.

As they say, there are 18 million cracks in the highest, hardest glass ceiling in this country — and the women of this country are not finished yet!

I’m absolutely inspired by this choice. And it says something about John McCain’s judgment and reputation as a maverick reformer that he “doubled down” on change, rather than picking a Washington insider.

Can you imagine running a business and having to make spending commitments a year into the future without any idea of how much revenue you’d have?

That’s the business of community colleges right now. As has been reported, Sierra College has about 7% student population growth, with expected state funding for only 3%. So we’ve tried to hit the right balance between being safe with our budget, and increasing access to college right now, when our students need it the most.

All this to say…the uncertainty about the state budget is beginning to wear thin.

I’m a strong believer that now is exactly the wrong time for a big state tax increase. That would have a hugely negative impact on the part time labor market that our students rely on to work their way through school. (We’d be glad to let the state come and take a look at Sierra College’s last four years of balanced budgets if they’re curious on how this works!)

But the Governor and our State Legislative Leaders need to step up and get a good budget passed, and one that doesn’t balance the budget on the back of our students.

Here’s a News 10 story on the effect of the ongoing uncertainty…

"If you look at our core classes, they’ve been full since June," said Chavez. "We’ve been unable to add sections primarily because of the uncertainty."

It’s the uncertainty of funding – the school doesn’t know how much they can plan to spend.

"Whether it will be adequate, totally inadequate, or anywhere in between," said Chavez. "We know it will not be great."

He believes that if the problem exists at Sierra College, it’s probably happening at community colleges across this state. They all operate off the same source of state dollars.

» Read the Full Article

The new Sierra College Tahoe-Truckee Campus is set to open ahead of schedule in October! Take a look at this great article in the Sierra Sun.

Photo Credit: Sierra Sun

With construction on schedule and a curriculum boasting a variety of new classes, doors may open early at the Sierra College campus in Truckee and enrollment is filling up fast.

“The new campus is really driving increased interest,” said Interim Dean Kurt Heisinger. “There are far more courses that are full this go-around than ever before.”

» Read the Full Article

A great event up in Nevada County…and they asked me to speak. We’ll try to post the video of my speech when we have a little bit more time, but here are some photos.

Talking to Tom McClintock about the state of the race. I’ve known Tom for ten years, and he’s going to make a great Congressman for our district.

Spencer was in fine form…there was a playground right next to the barbecue area, and it caught his eye immediately.

Serving up the baked beans…I always don the apron at this event and help out.

Being introduced by one of the finest Sierra College Trustees in our history…Nancy Palmer.

Talking about the importance of balanced budgets, increasing access to college, and how we can’t do the latter if we aren’t smart enough to do the former…for real!

And my only regret about this event was that Cacey took so many of the pictures, she didn’t get herself into any of them! We’ll remedy that in the future.

As you may know, the State of California has a "growth cap", which is the percentage of student population growth that Sierra College will be funded to accept. This year, our growth cap is 3%, but our actual student population growth is 7%.

How does that work? Well, this is part of the tradeoff of budgeting. We’re trying to balance building a budget surplus — which can protect core academic programs from big cuts if the state budget gets even worse next year — with increasing access to college, which requires us to hire more part-time instructors, out of our own pocket, to teach that extra 4% of unfunded student growth.

Our management team has been communicating with the Board of Trustees about this for months now, and I think that the college has struck just the right balance. But we are seeing some students turned away with many classes completely full — my sister-in-law is one of the people who can’t get into an English class she wants to take this fall.

Here’s the story…

Enrollment is up at Sierra College, which means students will have a more difficult time getting classes when the fall semester begins Monday.

The most recent figures show enrollment at the Placer County college is up about 7 percent – 18,208 this year, compared with 16,911 last year.

"Almost every class is full," said public information officer Sue Michaels. "Students are coming in and finding there are no spots for them."

Officials say in a down economy, people return to community colleges to retrain. Community colleges offer a wide variety of vocational and professional training at a low cost.

Michaels said students can still register and try to add classes as others drop them.

Because we get to read things like this while sending a fortune to the Middle East.

Another great story in the "Student Success" series from Sierra College, about a student in the Tahoe-Truckee area.

ROCKLIN – After three years at Sierra College, working and studying hard, Luis Ramirez, 22, is ready to take on an education at California Polytechnic State University, San Louis Obispo. He will be leaving Sierra with his A.A. in Architecture, but for Ramirez, this is only the beginning.

“Sierra College really prepared me for the future,” he said. “They helped get me an internship and encouraged me to do well.”

Ramirez grew up living in a small trailer in the town of Kings Beach, on the shores of Lake Tahoe.  A gifted student with a lot of drive, Ramirez enrolled in the Engineering Support Technology program at Sierra College, and did very well.  He received a Computer-Aided Drafting Specialist-Architectural certificate on May 11, 2007.  He is currently working for a local engineer and preparing to make the move to San Luis Obispo to begin the next step in his education.

“Sierra offers a lot of opportunities,” he said. “All the instructors and counselors are there to help out.”

Ramirez will always remember the feelings of excitement and anticipation he had during his first semester on campus. “It was great just being able to come to Sierra College,” he said. “Now that I have my A.A. degree, it feels amazing to be going to Cal Poly to be a part of their architecture program.”

Ramirez also credits the financial aid he received at Sierra College for making it possible for him to get an education. Applying for FAFSA helped to pay for tuition and he was also the recipient of a Dave Ferrari Scholarship. Dave Ferrari is a current and long time member of the Board of Trustees of Sierra College.  He grew up in and represents the Tahoe/Truckee region.  He runs Ferrari’s Crown Motel, a business founded and built by his parents in 1955.  Mr. Ferrari, a community activist, founder and board member of the Boys & Girls Club of North Lake Tahoe; also serves on the board of the Family Resource Center; and the Grants committee with the Tahoe/Truckee Community Foundation.

Ferrari is proud of Luis Ramirez’s accomplishments and suggested to the P/R Department that his story is worth telling.

Ramirez has many goals for the future and the education he has received at Sierra College has helped him to realize what he wants to do. “I had a unique experience at Sierra College,” Ramirez said. “My advice to incoming students is to relax and to work as much as they can with the counselors.”

“Really, I just want to be someone that my peers can look up to,” he said.

For a full list of classes and programs available at Sierra College, go to www.sierracollege.edu. Fall semester classes begin August 25.